A series of empirical studies explored implications of shame and guilt for interpersonal relationships in childhood and adulthood. Among adults, shame experiences were rated as more painful than guilt experiences, and were clearly related to a desire to hide, to escape from interpersonal contact, and to punish others. Guilt was related to a desire to confess and, to some degree, to make amends. In contrast, older elementary school students' phenomenological ratings of shame and guilt experiences were very similar for the two emotions. Adults showed a strong positive relationship between a tendency to externalize cause or blame and proneness to shame, but no such relationship for proneness to guilt. Among children similar trends were found. When the shared variance between shame and guilt variables was factored out, shame residuals were positively correlated with externalization and guilt residuals were negatively correlated with externalization for children and adults. For adults, proneness to shame was negatively correlated with empathy, while proneness to guilt was positively associated with empathy. Among children, correlations of shame and guilt with empathy were both positive. Implications are discussed. (RH)